Georgia Vietnam Veterans Alliance

Scholarship Program for Veterans, Children of Veterans and Spouses of Veterans:

The scholarships are generally for $1000.00 per award and there is no restriction on a student receiving awards for several sucessive years while in school. However, it is competitive award and the student must apply each year. Applications go out throughout the year and during the summer. They are turned over to the Scholarship Committee who takes them to one of the state Universities for ranking by Order of Merit. The board of the Alliance then passes final approval and awards the scholarships.

Since we have started the program, we have had student graduate from Georgia,Georgia Tech, Emory, West Georgia, Kennesaw, Georgia State University, and other schools. Several of the most exciting stories include a family in which the wife of a veterans who won a scholarship to complete her degree in teaching. She is now the sole bread winner in the family as her husband passed away shortly after her graduation and certification as a teacher.

In another instance, we awarded a scholarship to a plumber who used the money to get his mast plumbers schooling and certification. He is now the city inspector in a good sized town near Atlanta. Seeing the success of her husband, his wife has gone back to school and is pursuing a degree in Nursing.

We also have had several students go to college and have used their scholarship to assist them where their parents did not have the fund to help., were divorced, disabled, or seperated. In many of these cases, the children of the veterans were encouraged to attend school through the scholarship program being available and who most likely would not have give it a try without it.

In one case, a young lady wanted to go to Emory University and her parents were divorced. The mother was a secretary and the father, although a Vietnam veteran, could not help because he had a second family. The young lady had a dream though, and she presented her qualifications to the Alliance and her desire to become a nurse. She won scholarships several years in a row and graduated 2nd in her class, with honors, at Emory University. She is now a registered nurse and has done so well, she is at work on her doctorate.